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My next book will be out in one month. It is being published by Cambridge University Press and is titled, The Enablers: How Team Trump Flunked the Pandemic and Failed America. www.cambridge.org/enablers

As its title suggests, it is not primarily about former President Donald Trump. Rather it is about Trump’s followers. Especially about those who served the president, or in any case went along with whatever he did or said as it pertained to the pandemic, without meaningful dissent.

Despite Trump’s handling of the coronavirus being wretchedly misguided, miserably managed, and shockingly self-interested, the slavish adherence to the chief executive continued during his last year in office. The year during which he presided over the public health crisis, and during which 400,000 Americans died with barely an audible objection either from anyone serving in the administration, or from Trump’s feverishly devoted Republican allies.

Let me now pivot to another book, one in a series of several coming out this summer and fall, all slated to slash the president’s performance, especially though not exclusively during his final 12 months in the White House. So far, this one, titled I Alone Can Fix It, written by Washington Post reporters Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, has gotten the most attention.

The New York Times’ review of the book was mixed. It praised some aspects of it, while summarizing the whole as being “grueling” reading. It’s true, the book is a bit of a slog. It is 578 pages long, which means that for all but the most heavily addicted Trump junkies it provides far more detail than most of us want or need.

I did not read I Alone Can Fix It in its entirety, nor will I. Still, having recently written The Enablers I was struck again, thunderstruck again, by how passive, how servile, how weak, virtually all the main characters other than Trump himself. Just five among a sea of examples:

• On page 41: “Trump had no idea about the anxiety building [about the virus] among his experts.” Which raises the question of, why not? How could his “experts” have allowed him to “have no idea”? Why did they not force feed the president what they honestly thought? Even if it meant quitting their posts.
• On page 62: Alex Azar, then in the all-important post of Secretary of Health and Human Services, “tried to sound agreeable and understanding, having learned that when Trump was in a true frenzy, it was better to absorb his rage rather than argue.” Heaven forfend! Take on head on your boss when he’s cranky not to speak of downright mean? Even when your boss is dangerously wrongheaded?!
• On page 64: Son-in-law and toady-in-law, Jared Kushner, told Azar that Trump picked Vice President Mike Pence to head the coronavirus Task Force “because he wanted someone to focus solely on telling people the virus was under control.” Which, I hardly need add, Pence did.   
• On page 73: Dr. Robert Redfield, the hapless head of the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control, had his salary slashed smack in the middle of the virus crisis. Did Redfield object? He did not. Though he later feebly admitted, “I should have known from the beginning this guy [Trump] didn’t have my back.” Surprise, surprise! Trump other than fiercely loyal? Who would’ve guessed?!
• On page 98: Dr. Deborah Birx was a similarly belittled and derided medical professional. She gamely occupied a “windowless closet of an office,” toiling into the night to serve the country – and President Trump. Was it enough? Not hardly. “Soon, Birx found her access to Trump cut off” – primarily for the original sin of occasionally telling the president that which he did not want to hear. But did she quit? Did she protest? Did she say out loud what she really thought? She did not.

I Alone Can Fix It is full of such small stories. Full of evidence that Trump’s malfeasance was buttressed at every turn by everyone who was in, or in any way close to the administration. It is an irony that though books like these fixate on the leader, they unwittingly testify not just to his importance but to the equal importance of those who followed where he led. As The Enablers makes painfully clear, this is a story not just about leader malpractice, but about follower malpractice.   

In our book, Leaders Who Lust: Power, Money, Sex, Success, Legitimacy, Legacy, Todd Pittinsky and I used Melinda French Gates as a case in point. Though come to think of it…that’s not quite correct. It was Melinda Gates about whom we wrote – not Melinda French Gates. And given we were writing about their lust for legacy primarily as channeled through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, we wrote not just about Melinda but also about Bill.

Though our book is recent, we discussed the couple as if they were married, which until just a few months ago they were. Since then, they have separated, and announced they were divorcing. This made them not only the latest power couple to hit the skids, it also threw the future of their $55 billion foundation, a philanthropic juggernaut if ever there was one, into question.

A few days ago, it was reported that Bill and Melinda had agreed on a way forward. They would continue to run the foundation together, as partners, for two years. If they could work well together, they would continue to partner thereafter. If they could not, Bill would effectively pay Melinda off to buy her out.

In the book lust was defined as “a psychological drive that produces intense wanting, even desperately needing to obtain an object or to secure a circumstance.” When the object has been obtained, or the circumstance secured, “there is relief, but only briefly, temporarily.” Lust is, in other words, a lifelong passion, or even obsession.

Leaders who lust for legacy, such as Bill and Melinda, are fixated on what they leave behind after they leave this earth. What they crave is to “to leave an imprint that is permanent.” Which is why it comes as no surprise that divorce or no, so far as their lust for legacy is concerned, nothing has changed. If anything, their impending divorce will only heighten the desire of both Bill and Melinda to leave a legacy that endures.   

Over the years, Melinda French Gates has been largely private, not only about her private life but about her public preferences. While she has made clear her special interest in female empowerment, in addition obviously to the work of the foundation, she continued to operate largely behind the scenes. Invariably, perennially, it was Bill on whom the spotlight shone.

This will now change. Primarily though not exclusively because of her immense wealth, French Gates will inevitably have great power, considerable authority, and significant influence. She will be a leader in her own right – no longer merely her husband’s appendage. She might pour more of her money as well as energy into Pivotal Ventures, an investment vehicle she launched several years ago, dedicated to women’s causes. Or she might not – hard to be certain. She will in any case become an independent agent, which is to say her own lust for legacy will make itself apparent. I’m betting she will get what she now wants above all – to leave her own imprint that is permanent.

Lucky enough to have had some indisputably great leaders. Lucky enough to have had some presidents so widely and greatly admired that they have been ranked by historians to be at or near the top for the past twenty years.

For two decades C-Span has conducted surveys of which presidents are considered the best leaders.* This year 142 historians participated in the poll, in which they were asked to ranked America’s chief executives from 1 to 10 in each of ten leadership categories: public persuasion, crisis leadership, economic management, moral authority, international relations, administrative skills, relations with congress, setting an agenda, pursuit of equal justice for all, and performance within the context of the times.

During all the years the poll has been conducted, the following four presidents came out on top, and in just this order: Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Franklin Roosevelt, and Theodore Roosevelt. In fifth place this year was Dwight Eisenhower; in 2020, when the survey was first conducted he was ranked only 9^th . So there is some movement. But the group at the top has been remarkably consistent.

The results of the survey were just released. Which makes this a good day – this Independence Day in the United States of America – to make a prediction. To predict that one day, not so long from now, Joe Biden will be ranked by historians as among the greatest of American presidents.

I know. I have no business, especially as an ostensible leadership expert, to make so preliminary a judgement, so rash and risky a prediction. After all Biden has been in office a mere half year. Still, if you look at the man and what he accomplished during his first six months in office, and you compare these to the criteria for excellence developed by C-Span, it’s hard to dispute he has a fair shot.

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*C-Span’s surveys are conducted only when there is a change in administration, so each presidency can be evaluated in its entirety.  

When a leader says something pay attention. When a leader in a position of power says something pay a lot of attention. And when a leader in a position of great power says something pay undivided attention.

This week was the 100^th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Under President Xi Jinping the CCP has had a rebirth and ultimately a resurgence. It is stronger now than it has been in decades, arguably since the days of Mao Zedong, certainly since the transformative but much more temperate tenure of Deng Xiaoping, in the 1980s.

Especially in recent years Xi has used the CCP as a vehicle – and as a cudgel. As a cudgel to beat the Chinese people – including now the people of Hong Kong – figuratively if not literally about the head to get them to fall obediently into line. No dissent allowed, especially no dissent that constitutes any sort of challenge to the existing regime.

In other words, in its current incarnation the CCP is less an instrument of ideology than it is of behavior. China is at least as much capitalist as it is communist. But the CCP has become nevertheless powerful as a means of control.

No surprise then that Xi used the hundredth anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party – which was this week – to give a speech. It was an important one that resonated, as it should have, around the world. For the content of his rhetoric was noteworthy for its chest-beating – and even more for its belligerence.

Of course, some of the sabre rattling was for domestic consumption. Nothing suits Xi’s purposes more than to stir up the Chinese people with incantations that smack of nationalist fervor. But not all of his speech was targeted at those at home. Some of it was targeted at those abroad, especially at those in the West, specifically the United States.

I am not suggesting that President Joe Biden’s response should be to quiver in a corner. Nor am I intimating that he should become similarly belligerent, not even rhetorically. I am simply pointing out that sometimes leaders mean exactly what they say.

When Xi says that “the Chinese people will never allow any foreign forces to bully, oppress or enslave us,” and that “anyone who dares will have their heads cracked and their blood will flow before the steel Great Wall built with the flesh and blood of 1.4 billion Chinese people,” attention must be paid. If history has taught us anything it is that when an authoritarian leader – not to speak of a totalitarian one – issues a threat it should be taken deadly seriously. For it, history, is soaked with the blood of those who failed to believe what they heard – or for that matter read. Hitler’s Mein Kampf was not a speech. It was a book. It was a book in which he meant what he wrote.

The title of a recent New York Times article on Sundar Pichai, Google’s “affable, low-key” chief executive, was “Can a nice guy be an effective leader?” Well, the article answered the question. The answer was yes. No one was taking issue with Pichai’s splendid success as Google’s helmsman. The company had been regularly reaching new highs in both revenue and profits. Its parent company, Alphabet, was worth $1.6 trillion. And Google was inserting itself ever more deeply into the lives of ordinary Americans including, I might add, me!

What then was the problem? Why was there even a question that Google was fortunate to have at the top not only a splendid performer but a good guy to boot?

The answer has nothing to do with the leader. It has everything to do with his followers. We live in an age when enough is never enough. More specifically, we live in an age when followers are restive even when they have nothing much to be restive about. Subordinates bitching and moaning about their superiors has become part of the culture. It’s why leading in liberal democracies has become so damn difficult.   

This is not to insist that Pichai has been pitch perfect. Rather it is to point out that despite his stellar performance Google executives have taken to publicly complaining about his shortcomings. What might these be? Pichai is too risk averse. Pichai is too conventional and incremental. Pichai is too ruminative and reflective. Pichai is too sluggish and slow, too even tempered and too tolerant – including of Google occasionally outspoken workforce.   

No leader walks on water. But given Pichai’s track record, even if the bitchers and moaners have something legitimate to complain about, they might consider doing so in private. Better they should work with Pichai behind the scenes, to modify his failings, than out loud scold a man who has done far more good than harm for everyone in Google’s employ – not to speak of anyone who owns even a single share of Alphabet stock!     

Dictatorships can be slow in coming, so slow that initially they are imperceptible, hard to recognize as dangerous – possibly very dangerous. This is how it was in Xi Jinping’s China.

Now though there is no mistaking the grim reality. Living in China can be life-threatening to anyone and everyone the regime decides, for whatever reason, is an undesirable.

I use the term “life-threatening” literally – as when someone’s life is literally in danger. And I use the term metaphorically – as when what is in danger is the daily life, or lifestyle, to which the person is accustomed.

Hardly a day now goes by without news out of China that is deeply offensive, even painful to anyone who is a democrat. While ordinary Chinese who go quietly about their business are left largely alone, extraordinary Chinese, even those who are apolitical, frequently are not. The threat now is palpable to wealthy Chinese, especially the ultra-rich, who have come to think the better part of valor is to head for the exits, whether by cashing out or shutting up, or both, slipping in any case under Xi’s radar.     

And it is palpable as well to a raft of others, most of whom are much more vulnerable. These include: 1) members of groups that have failed to confirm to what the Chinese Communist Party wants, such as the Uighurs; 2) political and social activists who have sought in any way to challenge the regime; and 3) the people of Hong Kong who have had to learn a whole new way of being in the world since the Chinese authorities decided to clamp down – to swallow Hong Kong whole.

Lead sentence from an article in today’s Wall Street Journal, dateline Hong Kong: “Authorities sent shudders through Hong Kong media outlets after police arrested the top editor of a popular daily newspaper and the city’s security chief warned of severe punishment for anyone who uses news to challenge China’s national security.”   

Drip, drip, drip, dictatorship.

The literature on leadership focuses nearly entirely on the relationship between leaders and followers. From Plato’s Republic to Freud’s Moses and Monotheism to the countless contemporary tomes on the subject, the spotlight is on how leaders are, or are not, able to get their followers to do what they want them to do.

This suggests that there is at least one area of study that has been badly neglected: the relationship between leaders and leaders. What, in other words, is the dynamic between two (or more) people when neither is prepared to play the part of follower and when both seek to claim, and to maintain the mantle of leader?

As we have just seen, this is precisely what happens in the domain of international relations. When President Joe Biden flew to Europe last week to gather with many other leaders of many other countries, culminating in his encounter with Russian President Vladimir Putin, he met not with his subordinates or constituents, but with his equals. To be sure, the United States is much more powerful a country than is, say, France or Belgium. Still, When Biden got together with France’s President Emmanuel Macron or Belgium’s Prime Minister Alexander De Croo they did so as equals. One was in no formal or obvious way subservient to the other.    

The point pertains especially to the relationship between Biden and Putin. Though Russia is in virtually every way far weaker than the United States, it is a point of enormous pride to Putin to present himself as the equal of any other leader on the planet. In fact, anyone who understands Putin at all, or indeed what happened to Russia since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, has a visceral understanding of how important to Russia’s identity, and to Putin’s, is this posturing of strength.

Usually, one of a national leader’s most important domestic policy responsibilities is to initiate change and then to implement it. But, ironically, one of a national leader’s most important foreign policy responsibilities is precisely the opposite. In fact, managing leader-leader relations, as opposed to leader-follower relations, might well depend on the national leader’s willingness not to lead or, at least, not to appear to lead.

There was no way in hell that Putin was going to allow himself to appear anything less than Biden’s full equal. This meant that Biden’s task was to appear in charge and in control – while at the same time conveying to Putin that he was not trying in any way to dominate him.

The leader-leader dynamic tends to be especially fraught when it pertains to leaders of countries with a long history of conflict between them. With a few significant exceptions – such as the years 1941-45, during which Joseph Stalin and Franklin Roosevelt were wartime allies – the United States and Russia fall into this category.  For example, President Richard Nixon met several times with the leader of the Soviet Union, Leonid Brezhnev. But while these meetings were cordial enough, and sometimes even productive, there was no mistaking the impression  that each of the two men were the other’s equals. And that each were leaders of superpowers that were much more adversaries than allies. Not for nothing was the world at the time considered bipolar. Not for nothing were such meetings called summits.

Whatever the ultimate outcome of yesterday’s encounter between Biden and Putin, the dynamic between them is unfamiliar. Leader-leader relations differ from leader-follower relations in that the latter has been widely studied, while the former has not. This should change.

In recent weeks millions have watched a herd of 15 wild elephants embark on a long, strange trip out of the jungles of southwest China. Instead of staying where they were, they took to trekking in unfamiliar places – including in some sizable cities. Twitter and YouTube have become clogged with clips of their various antics, especially the babies, the latest media darlings not only at home, in China, but abroad.

Meantime, the experts have been baffled. Why would this herd do that? Normally elephants stay close to where they are: on or around their home ranges, turf they know. So, their behavior in this case is a departure.  

Which is why so much speculation about the explanation.  Search for a new habitat? A freshly developed taste for corn or other delectable, normally unavailable crops?

Or is it perhaps something altogether different? Is it a failure of leadership? Did the leader of the herd just get lost?

As a bit of a leadership expert myself, I cannot resist this theory. How could I take issue with Chen Mingyong, a professor at Yunnan University’s Asian Elephant Research Center, who says it could well be that the “lead elephant lacks experience” and, therefore, “led the whole group astray.”

Sound familiar? Far be it from me to anthropomorphize elephants! But who can deny that inexperienced leaders leading their followers astray is a behavior with which we, we humans, have had extensive experience?!

The piece below was originally posted on March 25th.

Did Joe Biden Push Kamala Harris to a Glass Cliff?

Marking time is a military term for marching in place. It refers to soldiers who move their legs and feet but who nevertheless stay in place as opposed to moving forward – which is the case now with Mark Zuckerberg. The iconic, demonic, founder and CEO of Facebook is in a holding pattern. He’s in a quandary really, brilliant as always at business, less than brilliant as always at navigating the roiling waters in which inevitably he is situated.

For all his singular success, Zuckerberg is under attack now not only from without – in addition to competitors, regulators at home and abroad are aching to rein him in – but from within. Facebook’s own employees are increasingly emboldened, daring openly to challenge company policies at odds with their values.

It happened recently when Facebook helped India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi to stifle dissent. It happened recently when Facebook removed posts from prominent Palestinian activists. And, of course, it happened not long ago when Facebook still gave former President Donald Trump access to its platform, no matter how outrageous his claims, no matter how fallacious his insistences.

To beat back the growing opposition, Zuckerberg created an oversight board, likened to a supreme court composed of supremely clever and beneficent sages charged with keeping Facebook on the straight and narrow. But the board serves at Zuckerberg’s pleasure. This does not mean that it is meaningless. It does mean that it is powerless at least as an independent agent able to check and balance the man to whom it is, after all, ultimately responsible.

Zuckerberg is not a leader in any conventional sense of this word. He is a czar.  A czar whose reach is as expansive as the planet he inhabits. Which is why it will take the power of the people finally, someday, properly to rein him in.   Meantime Mark marks time. He does not slide backward – but nor does he in ways that most matter move forward.